


Flat Planet

by dayblaze



Category: Earth: Final Conflict
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-04
Updated: 2016-06-04
Packaged: 2018-07-12 00:44:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7077526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dayblaze/pseuds/dayblaze
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>an efc barista au</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flat Planet

### the flat planet cafe

Josh is a boy who Augur has helping out at the cafe in the afternoons, sweeping up and washing dishes. JStreet set it up, asked for the favor; she came in to the Flat Planet with a set of reasonably convincing papers saying this is her cousin, he's 15 years old, he's enrolled in the DC public school system, he has permission to work part-time. Convincing until you look at the kid, who is scrawny, pale, pre-pubescent. Josh has gray eyes and brown hair and never takes off a pair of black fingerless gloves. 

With the Taelons gone, some of the kids -- the kids who were different before they went through an ID portal, babies born after their parents went to Companion fertility clinics, teenagers in the pipeline to join the Volunteers -- some of those kids have gotten turned out of their homes. Sometimes the CVI breaks down and causes erratic behavior. Sometimes they hit puberty and suddenly seem alien.

So Josh is not the first kid like this that Street has brought to him, although mostly they haven't worked out this well. Lili catches them stealing from the till, or they find something better, or they find something worse. They get sick. 

Augur and Street, they've been there; they were angry teenage runaways once upon a time. They don't ask questions. They know they can't save them all but Josh is welcome to all the blueberry muffins and hot chocolate he can stand.

*

"What kind of a name is Augur, anyway?" asks Josh, really not quite tall enough for the push broom he's sliding across the floor. "Is it from another country?"

Augur used to delight at this question, had a whole reel of an answer out of a thesaurus. But he's gotten older; he's mellowed out; he doesn't care to startle people for entertainment any more.

"It's a word," says Augur. "it's the same as a prophet. I chose it; I thought it sounded cool. Mysterious. And now it's been a long time and it's just what everyone calls me." Augur is measuring coffee beans into small paper bags. He picks up each bag and shakes it a little before folding it closed.

"My ma, she named me Marcus. My dad -- well. I was a lot smarter than my dad, and he knew it, and he didn't like it. We didn't get along so good. So I left. I thought to myself, if I stay, I know exactly how this is going to turn out."

Josh nods and hmms a little, still sweeping.

"What kind of a name is Josh?" Augur asks, careful, casual.

Josh doesn't look up. "Same kind, I guess."

*

Jonathan Doors is a famous rich person, and for a long time Liam Palmer had no idea that Jonathan was also his grandpa. People make jokes about him, about how smart he is, and how crazy, and how mean. Now that Liam lives in his house, Liam knows that the jokes are all true.

Jonathan Doors invented the global, like 30 years ago when it seemed impossible and a little silly, but now everyone has one, and that's why everyone knows that he's smart.

One time Jonathan Doors paid a guy to shoot him, and then pretended to have died from it, and then he went on TV and told everyone it was a trick, and then he ran for president and lost real bad, and that's why everyone knows that he's crazy. 

Jonathan Doors still goes on TV to say that the Companions were bad, even thought they've been gone a while now, longer then they were here to being with. What he says is that people shouldn't use anything that the Companions brought, shouldn't use interdimensional portals, or eat Saharan corn, or live in biogrown houses. He says people who are sick shouldn't take Taelon medicine; and if they'll die without it then they should die. 

All the crazy stuff happened when Liam was really little, too little to remember really, so he guesses that's why his dad never mentioned about how he had a grandpa. Liam guesses it made Dad sad, to think about how his own dad, who probably used to take him to ball games and stuff like that, was crazy now.

*

Liam's dad's name is Joshua, and Joshua teaches at the law school and his specialty is Extraterrestrial Law, because even though the Companions are gone people are still suing each other about stuff that happened while they were here. 

Liam's mom's name is Renee, and she's a lobbyist, which Liam doesn't know what that means exactly. They all have to go into the city for her work a lot, but that's okay because Liam loves the monuments, loves the museums, loves the flowing, shimmering building that used to be the Taelon embassy, different and more beautiful than anything he's ever seen.

But then they die, they both die all at once, and it sucks. And it turns out that he has a crazy grandpa and that sucks. And he has to go live with Jonathan, and that sucks. Everything sucks. Nothing has ever sucked as much as this.

*

If you ever try to talk to Jonathan about how he invented the global, about if it was hard, or how he knew it was a good idea, or anything like that, Jonathan gets really intense. Jonathan has this whole speech he gives if you ask him a question like that, and Liam pretty much has it memorized by now.

The speech is about how Jonathan didn't invent the global all by himself. He worked with a lot of people, and all of those people helped. All of those people were good at some things and bad at others. Some people were good at math, and some people were good at art, and some people were good at getting other people to buy things, and Jonathan couldn't have done it without any of them, and if Jonathan had tried to do it without them it would have been folly and surely would have failed, and you, Liam, should always remember that, should always remember that no one man can do anything; that no man is better than another, that no man can change the course of history, that no one man has the right.

*

When Liam's hands turn red and sore and glow, Liam knows exactly what it means. It means he must be one of those kids like on the news, kids who the Taelons messed up when they were babies, before they were even born when they were still inside their moms. Liam wonders if it also means, if the Taelons messed with him when he was a baby, if that means that Renee wasn't really his mom and Joshua wasn't really his dad and Jonathan isn't really his grandpa.

Liam knows for sure that Jonathan won't like it, real grandpa or not. Jonathan didn't even let Liam get a bioslurry wrap when Liam fell off his bike last summer and got a big cut on his leg; Liam had to the watch the needle going in and out of his skin; it was awful. 

Liam runs away. Liam changes his name and never uses portals and doesn't carry a global, but he does go back to DC where he used to live which is probably predictable. Jonathan is a rich genius and when a little bit of time goes by and Jonathan still hasn't found him, Liam starts to think that maybe he isn't looking. Maybe he already knew.

*

Liam likes the Flat Planet. Liam stays mostly in the upstairs, which has really big windows and some chairs and some couches, and they serve coffee, which Liam doesn't like, and sandwiches, and muffins and stuff like that. There's also a downstairs with rooms you can rent if you want a really fast datastream; that's why they come here, because Street likes to do that sometimes. 

Liam lives with Street; she acts like she's his big sister, or maybe like he's her doll. Street doesn't live anywhere in particular but he lives with her anyway; they sleep on her friends' floors, or in warehouses, or they stay out all night and nap in the reading room at the library during the day. 

They don't need any money because Street knows how to do all this hacking stuff; she tells her cash card to act like there's money on it and it does.

She knows Augur from way back and he taught her a long time ago how to do that kind of stuff, and some day she's going to teach Liam, but right now she thinks he's too young and precious to turn to a life of crime and will definitely end up in the system if he tries.

Anyway that makes Augur like his grand-hacker and if Street ever gets arrested or hit by a bus then he should ask Augur for help.

Augur is a guy who a lot of people seem to ask for help; the cafe really doesn't sell very many sandwiches but there are always people there. Augur seems to keep it open mostly so that he can drink a constant stream of espressos without ever having to get up and order them. 

The upstairs doesn't need to make any money because the downstairs makes a lot. The datastreams are fast and cheap and people seem to think that they're better somehow; Augur is some kind of internet-famous open-source guy who thinks information wants to be free, and everyone wants to use these streams because they're his.

Liam is here a lot, just kind of killing time while Street is plugged in. Lili, the manager, gives him a job cleaning up after the kitchen closes. 

Lili likes to tell stories sometimes about flying choppers in the SI War, or about going into space for the Taelons. It's funny to think about sometimes, Lili being this tough Marine, when all he's ever seen her be tough about is whether there are any fingerprints on the pastry display box, or whether Augur is allowed to act kissy with her in public.

Eventually she even promotes him; she teaches him to wait tables, and then to make gross coffee drinks and he starts making tips and that's great. 

They let him eat whatever he wants and none of them ever say a thing about his parents, or his future, his gloves, or anything real like that. That's great too.

*

There are two guys in suits who come into the cafe a lot. Not a lot, a lot, not every morning always at the same time on the way to work like some people do. These guys come in maybe once every two weeks and do the same thing each time. 

The shorter one is maybe Indian, and Liam guesses that he knows Lili and Augur because he just breezes on back to the back room without asking. Then the other guy, a pretty average looking white guy, he comes up to the counter and orders for the both of them, and asks specifically for a receipt.

Food Guy takes a couple of cookies with him to the table by the window, and Liam brings out the sandwiches and lattes when they're ready. Food Guy eats and waits for Short Guy. Short Guy takes his time, always at least half an hour, sometimes longer. Then he comes out and snaps at Food Guy, who stuffs all the sweets in his pockets, throws out the rest of the food, and they leave. Short Guy's latte never gets touched.

One day Food Guy notices Liam glaring and gestures him over. There's no one else in the cafe right now; Liam's got time.

"You got a problem, kid?" he asks.

"Only I don't know why I gotta make the latte if no one's going to drink it," says Liam.

Food Guy smiles, picks up the second latte and drinks it all down in one long gulp, grimacing a little; it must be cold by now.

"I'm Frank," he says.

"Josh," says Liam.

Then Short Guy comes out and glares at them.

"Feeling better, Ron?" Frank asks as he deals with the trash. 

Ron looks a little queasy.

Then they leave and it's business as usual, except from then on Frank always makes the second coffee a plain drip.

*

Now that he's looking, Liam sees that Frank and Ron actually come in more often than he thought. They just don't always do their weird routine, they don't always come together, and they don't always order at all. 

And since the Broadcast, they come by even more often. 

He knows by now, he's overheard, that Frank and Ron worked for the Taelons too. They're real worked up about the Broadcast. Everybody is real worked up about the Broadcast but it actually has something to do with them, Lili and Frank and Ron.

Basically what happened is, some scientists detected a transmission, and that transmission means the Taelons are still here, or the Taelons are coming back, or that there are different aliens coming, or something. No one knows what exactly and everyone is freaked out.

It seems like a lot of things could happen.

Liam hopes the one thing that doesn't happen is that the Taelons stop by just long enough to beam up all the part-alien kids they made and then do horrible experiments on them, which-- Well, why did the Taelons make a whole bunch of alien kids and then just leave? Didn't they do it for a reason? What if the reason is nasty? Jonathan always thought so.

His hands hurt sometimes. He takes a pill and it goes away. 

*

Liam's had a headache all day. He took an aspirin but it's only gotten worse. He's alone at the counter right now; he puts his elbows down on it and rests his eyes, just for a minute.

The bell over the door rings and he looks up.

A man comes into the Flat Planet; a tall man with red hair, and behind him are two women. One's a grown up, as old as the man. The other is younger, a teenager; older than Liam, younger than Street. Liam is staring at them. He can't not stare at them.

The older woman is looking at him. Or near him. She tilts her head a little, like she's curious, or maybe like a nod. Something in between. She makes a gesture with her hands; it looks uncomfortable.

The younger one is also looking, but -- differently. Angrily. Liam feels -- hot. Buzzing. Tall. Slimy. His head hurts more than it did. His hands hurt. He backs up a step. 

"Well?" snarls the girl. "Are you pleased?"

The man hasn't looked their way; he's scanning the room. At the sound his attention sharpens. He looks at Liam. His arm starts to glow. That guy's whole arm is like Liam's hand.

Liam's hands get hotter, hurt more. He closes them into fists at his sides and it feels raw and awful, like an open blister. He doesn't like it. He doesn't like any of this.

The man's arm is moving.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" bursts in Augur suddenly, coming out of the office. "Will! Buddy! Compadre! We were all just totally thrilled hear from you! Delighted to find you not dead!" 

Augur keeps babbling at them, pulling Will by his left arm, which is not the glowing one, through a hole in the wall that used to be a painting. It's been a painting the entire time Liam's worked here. There's a silver hallway on the other side. They all go through. Liam stays where he is and doesn't take his eyes off the girl until they're out of sight.

He feels-- a little better. He sits down on the floor. He looks at his hands. His gloves are ruined, crispy in the center. Still hot. That's never happened before. He wants to leave but he's -- tired.

Lili comes in, out of the silver place. She doesn't see him for a second; has peer over the till. She comes around the counter and sits down next to him.

"Josh?" she asks, "You want. You want me to call Street?"

"no," he says, miserable. His gloves are ruined. His head hurts. That whole thing was strange and terrible and now everyone knows that he's strange and terrible and they won't like him anymore and Street won't let him follow her around and he'll have no place to stay and he'll have to beg on the sidewalks and he'll get caught by the police and they'll give him back to Jonathan who didn't even want him to begin with and who probably isn't even really his grandpa. He's no one. He's nothing. He might even freeze to death, this time of year.

She gets up on her knees for a second, fusses around on the counter, then comes back down with a cookie. Two cookies. She keeps one for herself. When she was kneeling like that her sweater pulled up at the back and he could see there was a gun tucked in her waistband. Has Lili always had a gun?

"I have to go back down there," she says. "Do you think you can stay here until I get back?"

Liam nods. Basically at this rate he might never move again.

"Eat your cookie," she says, and uses the edge of the counter to pull herself to her feet. He can hear her fussing in the main room for a minute before she goes through the painting. Turning the Open sign over to Closed. Latching the front door.

He waits. 

This is awful. He's never in his whole life felt so bad as this. 

Maybe when his parents died. But that was. He was younger. And it was normal; there was nothing bizarre about it. It was only sad.

He looks at the painting that's been moved to the floor. He doesn't get art.

After a while he hears a knock at the front door and twists around to look. It's Ron. He guesses he can open the door for Ron.

He does. He gets up and walks over there and twists the latch and holds it open while Ron comes in and twists the latch again after it's closed. It's an enormous effort.

"They're in the hole," he gestures.

Ron doesn't go. Ron seems totally bewildered to have found a crying boy here.

Jeez, is he crying? What a baby. He swipes at his face and feels the scratch of the charred glove and it only makes it worse.

Ron hands him a handkerchief from the front pocket of his jacket. Ron steers him over to the dragon couch, sits down next to him.

"Don't you have to go down there?" Liam asks. Snuffles.

"They can tell me about it later, I'm sure." Ron says, "What's wrong up here?"

Liam can't really pull it together enough to answer.

"Hey, hey. Come on. Kiddo. Josh." 

Josh. "That's not even my name," he moans. His real name that no one even knows, that no one has called him for a year. When he dies of this misery they'll put the wrong name on his tombstone.

"Hmm? What do I call you then?"

Liam tells him. 

Ron frowns. Frowns? Ron's barely ever even said anything to him before and now he gets to frown at his name? Like it's a bad name? That's outrageous. It's a great name. His dad gave him that name. Ron is the worst for frowning at it and Liam starts to get angry, starts to push away from Ron, who is just trying to be nice, giving him handkerchiefs and patting at his back even while Liam is shoving at him.

Liam keeps shoving until there's no more shove left in him, and that's it, he's done, he's so tired. Everyone knows what's going on except him. He collapses against Ron.

Maybe it'll be better in the morning.

### before

Sandoval misspeaks and knows it is the end of him. 

Da'an's flowing hands slow for a moment, become loose and uncoordinated in their pattern. Zo'or, visible in the holostream, flickers. Then it's over. The meeting. The indecision.

"Major," says Da'an, two fingers of the right hand pointing up, the others curled together, a slow rotation. "You will accompany Agent Sandoval to the Mothership."

*

The shuttle is in the rose garden; the walk there is damp, fragrant, well-surveilled by Volunteers in tac vests. Shift-change is no time soon.

Sandoval hesitates at the entrance, then clambers up when Kincaid shifts his weight, his jacket falling open over the pulse rifle at his hip. 

They're aloft.

Maybe he could have over-powered Kincaid, before they took off. The other man is better trained in combat but lacks the improved reflexes of an Implant. Kincaid is taller, heavier, younger, armed. Sandoval's skrill wants to wait.

A few minutes to enter the coordinates; to calculate the orbits. They enter ID. It's a long flight to the Mothership.

Sandoval doesn't know how to pilot a shuttle; would certainly crash, likely be injured. The crash would be located instantly, and he would be covered in energy residue, easily tracked. 

"I want to ask you something," says Kincaid from the pilot's station, adjusting the course. 

"I'm sure you'll be given a chance at the interrogation, Major."

"Do you see any way out of this?"

Sandoval closes his eyes and doesn't answer. Doesn't answer. Doesn't answer. 

He could knock out Kincaid and get the gun; he could kill himself before they reach the Mothership. Raven won't help.

"No," Sandoval admits. What a ghastly life. Once he's been re-implanted he won't mind.

Kincaid pulls open his seat restraints. Goes to the back of the shuttle. Sandoval can hear him clanging around back there, among the maintenance equipment. Comes back with a single-shot ID portal.

"All right," says Kincaid. "Let's go."

*

"You should have asked me," snaps Marquette, "You never ask."

Kincaid and Marquette are arguing. They appear to be underground; the walls are rough and sand-colored rock behind glass panels.

"Look, I don't think Sandoval being here is actually our biggest problem right now," says their technologist, Augur.

"Of course not," says Marquette. "We have many, many problems right now." Her global chirps insistently, and she heads toward the elevator, violently shrugging on a jacket and tucking a gun into her holster. They all know what the call's about.

The elevator doors close on her and she barks, "Figure this out."

Augur has been admiring her departure and turns back to them.

"So," he says, "What did you do today?"

*

As far as Sandoval has been able to determine, this is the situation: 

Kincaid, a Liberation spy, has revealed himself by aiding Sandoval in his escape. 

Due to their close professional relationship, Marquette, also a spy, may also be compromised and will certainly be interrogated.

Marquette thinks it likely that Sandoval has faked his disgrace in attempt to root out any sympathizers, and that Kincaid has fallen into the trap. Kincaid possibly should not have intervened at all, and even if the threat was real it should not have been him who acted.

Kincaid is certain that immediate action was called for. Marquette cites Kincaid's history of brash behavior and poor decsion-making.

If, as he should have, Marquette says, Kincaid had stayed out of it, Kincaid would have remained in a position of trust with the Companions and possibly would have been able to influence Zo'or's decision on a replacement attache. Now both of Kincaid's and Sandoval's positions are vacant and the Liberation is unlikely to be able to maneuver their agents into place in a timely manner.

Marquette will have to take over intelligence gathering tasks and manipulation of events in the DC office, and she is not as well-positioned to do so. There may be a deficit of intelligence needed for upcoming Liberation operations. The all-hands hunt for Sandoval and Kincaid will additionally disrupt operations already in progress.

Avenues of information and control which Kincaid has put into place in the last year will be closed as all of the traitor's actions are reviewed and called into account. If it is true that Sandoval has his own agenda, this may be equally true of him. (Yes.) If Kincaid had maintained cover and allowed a low level operative to aid Sandoval, they may have been able to gain access to Sandoval's intelligence sources without destroying them.

There is some additional debate about what and how much and how soon to tell Jonathan Doors, who is still involved despite his public disavowal and presidential candidacy, and with whom there has been some ideological schism.

Marquette, now tasked with finding both Kincaid and Sandoval, thinks that the best course of action is to end the search by faking their deaths. This would require the collusion of senior members of their organization, including a person they refer to as the Doctor. 

Kincaid thinks he may be able to salvage his own position, perhaps by claiming to have been taken hostage, and doesn't want to act too soon. 

Marquette offers to give him a convincing black eye for verisimilitude. 

Marquette is certain that any credibility Kincaid had with Da'an is gone, and that possibly Da'an may now choose, or be forced, to voice to Zo'or pre-existing doubts about Kincaid's loyalty to the Synod. The nature of these doubts is unclear.

Augur has mostly been keeping out of it, but has been jumping between three different computer displays and whistling lowly to himself the entire time. He confiscated Sandoval's global as soon as they arrived (directly to this location and a gun pointed his face). The device is in pieces on the bench.

*

Kincaid flops down on a couch across from Sandoval. He's on his back; one arm is over his eyes and the other trails on the floor, hidden from Sandoval behind the coffee table. He pulls his knees up so his feet push against the arm of the couch. The slouch makes him look younger.

"Did you know all that?" he asks.

"Not much of it," says Sandoval. "Some. I suspected."

Kincaid uncovers his face and turns only his head to look at Sandoval, meet his eyes. "Did you know this?" he asks, and raises up his arm from behind the coffee table, waves it a little, wiggles his fingers. His hand is glowing. He appears to posses shaquarava.

Sandoval did not know that. "Who-- What did they do to you?"

Kincaid looks confused. Perhaps he did think Sandoval already knew about the procedure. Sandoval certainly knows several things that don't appear to on the Liberation's radar.

"No, I-- I was always like this. I'm an alien." 

Sandoval has several questions and doesn't ask any of them.

"I'm not from. outer space or anything. I was born here, to do this. To influence the situation here."

Kincaid is speaking slowly, picking over vague words.

"I was given. Instructions. About the Taelon occupation of Earth. So I contrived to get close to them."

Kincaid puts his still glowing hand over his face. It doesn't seem to hurt.

"She's right; I've blown it. Without access to Da'an I can't do what I'm here to do."

"Which is?"

Kincaid seems like maybe he's trying to figure out how to phrase it, but Augur interrupts them with a news about the hunt.

*

Augur is asleep even though it's nearly lunchtime; he's been running on fumes and stims for days, faking sightings, misdirecting the manhunt, adding more noise to drown out any signal. He can't do it indefinitely and Liam feels guilty that he has to do it at all. 

Lili is still out there pretending to look, and still angry. Liam gets it, he does. He seriously compromised the whole Resistance but he couldn't. He couldn't.

Sandoval is up and at one of the computer terminals, trying to write down everything he knows, anything the Resistance might be able to use. It's been a couple days and Lili has had to admit that the scale of the manhunt, the depth of Zo'or's rage, seem to legitimize Sandoval's claims. 

He's been debriefed a couple of times, more to come. The level of detail the CVI provides makes it hard, to sift through everything Sandoval knows, some of the conclusions he's come to don't make sense to the rest of them, but Sandoval seems so certain, tries to explain his reasoning again and again. There's a lot to type up.

Sandoval's given up on the jacket and tie. His shirt is crumpled and the sleeves rolled up. Liam can see the skrill.

Liam thinks about it, what he's going to do, and what might happen. He might die trying-- Ha'gel could have been wrong. It might not even work. Or he might-- he might be made for this and only this, might succeed and burn himself away. Or if he survives he might be captured, might die on a dissection table. He might be killed by an overzealous Volunteer before he even gets where he's going. 

Or he might not die. Might never die and never have another chance, both things could be true, and forever.

Is Liam a liar and a coward? Is this how men face each other? Liam's not always sure he is a man. He wishes he could be. So he says, 

"Hey," and Sandoval turns to face him and he grabs Sandoval's arm, slides his grip down to pull open his hand, presses his own palm to it. Thinks hard and real about the things that he knows and loves and believes. Thinks them pure, unerring, thinks them true. 

Then he knocks Sandoval out with the butt of his gun.

*

It's a Sunday and that's why he chose it, filtering out of the Cathedral with the parishioners at the end of the service. Liam stays with the crowd, gets on the closest Metro stop, takes it as far as he can.

Then Liam takes off his sunglasses. He discards all veil and pretense. He walks toward the Embassy.

When he anoints Zo'or it is very bright, blindingly bright and hard and painful, but he doesn't have to endure it for long and when it is done they are both of them new, and young, and tired.

### in my native tongue

Liam wakes up gummy, thirsty, in a cave filled with computers. He had-- he had a terrible dream, that didn't make any sense. And he doesn't really remember much about it now, because that's how dreams work. But he remembers that it was awful, and he feels bad, physically, in his stomach, in his head, when he thinks about it.

And now Lili, who had a gun yesterday and who now seems to live in a cave -- Liam always assumed she lived in a totally normal apartment! -- Lili, who is supposed to be his friend but actually lives in a cave, won't let him leave.

Which is ridiculous! Liam is not a prisoner. Liam is not child. Liam picks up a book off the coffee table and throws it at her.

*

"Okay," says Augur, who came in and saw what was happening and sent Lili to go buy them both bagels, "first of all, Street is busy right now, but she's going to come over later. Second, I like you, Josh, and you've been doing a real good job working for me, but you are not allowed to throw art history retrospectives at anyone."

Liam did know that and is starting to feel ashamed about it -- about throwing the book and ruining it, about the 'oof' noise that Lili made when it hit her, about ever having had the totally bonkers idea that Lili was trying to kidnap him.

"Third, mostly I don't care about knowing other people's secrets, but that was weird yesterday, and we're going to talk about it."

Liam does not want to talk about it ever and especially does not want to talk about it here. Liam doesn't like it here. There are computers everywhere and they're all watching him with blinking little red eyes.

"What if someone hears? Through the camera," Liam says, when Augur won't give up. He says it to his feet.

"Oh ho," says Augur "I'm the best there is. Ain't nobody looks through my cameras but me. And who would want to?"

Liam shouldn't even say. Liam's going to have nothing left to protect him. But he really -- he can't stay here with all these cameras. "Jonathan Doors," he says. 

Augur looks pretty surprised and actually gets up and unplugs some cables, and turns a couple of the displays all the way around so they aren't facing Liam. He takes off his glasses and hooks them into his shirt with the lenses facing in. "You're right," he says. "Jonathan Doors could look through my cameras if he felt like it. Does he?"

"I guess," Liam says. "I guess he's probably looking for me. He's my grandpa."

Augur looks-- Augur looks, actually, thunderously mad for a second. "Well," says Augur. "Don't you worry about that."

So Liam admits that he didn't like that girl, that he didn't know why, that he was never so mad before as when he saw her, that he guesses he knows that his hands mean he's one of those messed up Taelon babies like on the news, that his hands had done that glowing thing before but that yesterday was more, and worse, that he didn't feel good all day yesterday and he still doesn't feel good today.

"Hybrid," says Augur, "is a word that means messed up Taelon baby like on the news. Although usually when people use it they're talking about cars. Let's go to the doctor."

Liam's old doctor had an office in a big concrete building with a huge parking garage, but they don't go anywhere like that. Augur makes a call and then they go to the Flat Planet like usual, and then into Lili's office, and then through a door that Liam thought was a supply closet -- that is a supply closet, in the sense that there's three stacked boxes of printer paper on the floor -- but is actually an elevator. And then they're in the silver place behind the painting.

*

The doctor is an older lady who Liam recognizes. She likes the dark roast and takes it black.

"Well, yes, Josh, you're definitely an alien hybrid," says Doctor Belman, who is actually looking over Liam's head at Augur behind him. Liam doesn't mind she isn't looking at him; he isn't looking at her. He's looking at the huge white robot arm that's on the other side of the room. It looks like a snake. It isn't moving. Liam hopes it never moves.

She took a little blood and put it in a machine, and now it's magnified on a computer screen. It's blobby and pink. In the corner of the screen it says "CONFIRMED" in red four times, one on top of the other.

"But that's normal for you; you've been fine so far. Although I want to hear about it if your hands change." She had poked them and asked if it hurt, which it didn't, not really. She asked if he could make them glow right now, which he couldn't. She asked when was the last time they had glowed, which was yesterday, and the whole reason that they came to the doctor today.

"What I am concerned about is you're a little thin. Are you hungry often?" She's shining a light in his eye, looking through it.

"Uh," says Liam.

"And you seem tired. How have you been sleeping?" She uses a popsicle stick to push down his tongue.

"Uh," says Liam.

"Mhm. And how's school? What grade are you in?" She's feeling his throat with both of her gloved hands, pressing a little.

"Uh," says Liam.

"Vegetables. Naps. Homework," the doctor says to Augur. She gives a Liam green lollipop.

When Liam and Augur leave the medical room the doctor leaves too and she goes into a room across the tinfoiled hall. Liam can't even tell it's a door until she opens it. Inside Liam can see Lili and Ron and the tall man from yesterday all arguing and when the door closes behind her he can't hear them at all.

*

After that he stays in the cave with Lili and Augur. It turns out that the Broadcast was right and the Taelons are back for real, and Street doesn't want to live in DC anymore. She says it's going to be too hot here. It's winter, thinks Liam. 

Everyone seems to think that Liam going with her would be a bad idea, and Liam doesn't want to go anyway, but he'll miss Street. She said she'd visit, but it hasn't happened yet.

Everyone also seems to think that it's a bad idea for a Taelon hybrid kid to be hanging out on his own once the Taelons get back. Liam was already afraid, in like a "don't watch the X-Files after dark" kind of way, of being maybe abducted by the Taelons and dissected, or having to live on their ship and do their biding, or of turning more and more alien until he's one of them, and now every adult in his life is acting like those might actually be a real things that could happen.

Anyway, Lili asks if there's someplace else he'd rather stay and there isn't.

Lili says that Doctor Belman is always right about everything and if the doctor says that Liam should be in school then he's going. Augur is going to fake all the papers so it looks like he just moved here. 

First Liam has to take a test about what grade he should be in. It's printed out on paper, multiple choice that he has to circle, big empty spaces to show his work for the math questions. It feels familiar and normal, to turn the page in the stapled packet, to tap the pencil eraser against his teeth while he thinks, to write his name at the top of each page. 

It's just Lili who's going to grade it, and when she's done she comes over and sits next to him on the couch and shows him where he wrote "Liam Palmer" on the first page. There goes his last secret. It was real polite that Ron didn't tell on him, but now Liam's gone and told on himself. Liam guesses he didn't have fill it in at all. It's only Lili looking at it, not a teacher with a classroom of kids to tell apart. It was just habit.

"You want to be called this?" asks Lili.

Liam guesses that would be okay. It might even be nice.

*

Liam Marquette is thirteen years old and he lives with Lili because his parents died, and both of those things are true enough. Liam helps out at the Flat Planet Cafe after school, which is only allowed because his aunt owns it. 

Liam is in the seventh grade at Saint Michael's Parochial. Liam isn't Catholic and neither is Lili or Augur but it's really convenient because they live underneath the church. Liam Marquette is a B student and sometimes he answers wrong on purpose to stay that way. 

The frequent rash on Liam's hands is uncomfortable but not communicable, the result of a mild nut allergy and a genuine love of almonds, and the school nurse has been made aware of it.

Liam is in the photography club. He takes a photo of the outside of the Cafe, the neon sign on a foggy night, and Lili frames it and hangs it inside on the wall right as you walk in.

Liam's favorite customer is Ron, who compliments the photograph right away and who has discovered he really likes the cherry strudel. He gets a slice of strudel nearly every day after work and always asks about school and leaves a good tip. Sometimes Frank comes too and winks when Ron goes into Lili's office and doesn't come out.

Liam hits a growth spurt; he is gawky and his hair always looks stupid. 

Liam has nightmares.

*

He must have been making noise because Lili actually comes over and wakes him up. There weren't really rooms in the cave when he moved in, just glass walls that intersected oddly, making airlocks, cubicles, writing surfaces, projection screens. But Augur moved some and painted others, and now Liam has a room. 

Lili wakes him up and asks if he wants to talk about it.

"I don't know," he says, "It's stupid." 

Lili is sitting next to him on the bed and rubbing his back a little. She doesn't usually act very mom-like. But sometimes. "Tell me anyway," she says.

Liam has two dreams; the same two dreams over and over again, both of which scare him. He only tells Lili about the first one.

He's in a blue room. Everything is blue or purple, the floors and the ceilings and the chairs and everyone's clothes. There are windows and it's night outside, but there's nothing out there, no buildings or street lamps, it's totally black, darker than the real world ever gets. Everyone is watching him. There's a Taelon there and Liam walks up to it, fast, and grabs at it, and it screams. And then it's like. Just kind of white, and nothing's happening, and he's scared.

"Oh, buddy," Lili says, and some other kind words, and gets up to make him a glass of warm milk.

The second dream that he keeps to himself is worse somehow. But it's more concrete. Harder to talk about because he understands it better. There's a woman in exercise clothes, climbing a rock wall above him-- the real kind, not the fake plastic kind in a gym. It's difficult for her. She starts to slip, and he tries to catch her, but he can't, and she dies from the fall, and there's blood all over her head. Then he looks up and there's a man at the top of the rocks who watched the whole thing. But Liam has learned about metaphors and he understands this dream; it's about how what if Jonathan killed his mother.

*

Liam is tending counter when that lady comes in again. The lady with the angry daughter. Liam looks around, tries to look behind her to see if the daughter is coming too. He doesn't see her. The lady on her own is fine. Probably. He shouldn't not like her just because, he never even really met her. He can be nice.

The lady is just standing there reading the whole menu board behind him. She's actually been standing there a really long time; long enough to have read it a couple of times already. 

"What is best?" she asks eventually.

"Uh," says Liam, "I don't know; I don't drink coffee. I like the hot chocolate. And the orange juice."

"The juice I will attempt," she agrees. "Will you join me in this?"

This is weird. She's standing awkward, her arms kind of poking out. Her face is very long and very thin; her eyes are very big. She's taller than most women and she talks slow. Maybe she's foreign. Maybe she's disabled. It's not polite to stare.

"No thank you," Liam says. "I already ate."

She comes a little closer to him, up the the till to pay.

"Do you know who I am?" she asks.

"Uh," says Liam, "You're Will's friend, right?" Will has been back, alone, lots of times since the incident. Will used to the work with the Taelons, same as Lili and Ron, and Doctor Belman too. They're all buddies from back then. Will always thinks hard about what he wants and then orders the usual, which is a cortado.

She nods, but also doesn't nod. "I am called Dawn," she stutters over her own name. "I greet you."

"Uh, hi," says Liam. "I'm Liam."

"Yes," she says. 

He hands her cash card back to her and instead of taking it back she reaches out and grazes his arm with her fingertips.

It's a strange moment and then it ends. Liam shakes the feeling away.

Dawn picks up her juice and sips it. A broad smile passes over her face. She turns around and leaves.

"Macchiato," says the guy next in line.

*

Will comes in. He looks frantic. He sees Liam, he cuts the line. The customers are annoyed.

"Hey, hey kid, my friend came here? Tall woman, thin?"

"Dawn?" says Liam,"She left."

"When?"

"I dunno, fifteen minutes, half an hour?"

Will is cursing under his breath, pulling out his global. He looks at Liam, all ready to ask a question, like, which way did she go, what was she wearing, but then stops and looks at him hard.

"She say anything to you?"

"Uh," says Liam.

"Jeez," says Will, and suddenly he's raising his voice, saying "Hey folks, kitchen's closed, get outta here," which he is definitely not allowed to do, and then he's grabbing Liam's arm, pulling him through Lili's office and the elevator into the silver hallway. He opens a bunch of hidden doors, revealing room after room until he finds one that's occupied. Ron is in there. It's not a big space; there's a glass desk and a computer. He's typing.

"Deal with this," says Will, "I gotta find Dawn."

He slams the door shut behind him.

*

It's just Ron, who Liam sees most days, but Liam feels nervous. Will was acting like such a freak.

"What's happening?" Ron asks, still kind of looking at his computer screen.

"Uh," says Liam, "Will's upset because Dawn bought an orange juice."

Ron smiles like that's funny, when really Liam thinks it's kind of messed up that Will cares what his girlfriend has for lunch, no matter what weirdos they both are.

"Did she say anything to you?" asks Ron.

"I mean, she ordered."

"Boone came to speak with Augur?" 

"It was just her," says Liam, and that gets Ron's attention.

"Dawn came in, she said 'I'd like an orange juice, please,' and she left?"

"Well--she didn't know what she wanted to drink. And she introduced herself."

Boy, Ron is pissed off. Why? Is Dawn really allergic to orange juice? "You shook hands?"

"Uh. No. Uh. She touched my arm?"

"Did it hurt?" 

What? "No? It was just like--" But when Liam tries to think about it, to think about that moment -- he was holding her cash card in his left hand, and she, with her right hand, reached past the card and touched the inside of his wrist, kind of like she took his pulse. When he starts to think about it he thinks maybe it did hurt; he thinks it made him drop the card, the receipt, the pen. He looks down at his hand and sees he has a bruise. "Sandoval," he says, for no reason, and feels suddenly exhausted.

### downstairs

"Jeez, Lili, I don't know," says Boone. "Zo'or was already different when they brought me out of stasis, I guess for him it was instantaneous. For Da'an it was slow; when I woke up he still pretty much looked like before. It's taken basically this whole time before he was completely solid. But when it finished in Da'an, the process began in a third Companion." 

Belman is ready with the science: "It's contagious? Or is it a kind of parasite that jumps from one to the next? Have they tried to contain it? Does it present in humans?"

"It spreads through the Commonality; they say Da'an was first because he and Zo'or are related really closely, Da'an is like Zo'or's mother. It's going to propagate out that way, through the family tree. They think within two hundred years, all the Taelons will have changed. There's a lot of political upheaval in reaction. It hasn't all shaken out yet."

"That's not an answer," says Belman.

"I really don't see how this is our problem," says Lili, "They came here because they had a genetic problem, Ha'gel and Liam solved it for them, they left, and they can stay gone."

"The science caste say they're all going to be women. That's why they've come back. They're going to establish a. Uh. Eugenics program. More eugenics programs."

"Ugh," says Lili.

"Boone," says Augur, "Did you hit that?"

"He's pregnant," says Boone; also not an answer.

*

"Look, okay, first of all, Ron, you're some guy who orders coffee," says Marquette. "He doesn't know you. He doesn't know anything about you. Second, Augur says the Lair is totally impervious to Taelon scans and if you don't want them to find him in ten seconds flat, that's where he's got to stay. Third, you better believe you're going to be under some public scrutiny when the Taelons go public. You can't suddenly be living with a boy who doesn't look anything like you."

She's right. Sandoval knows she's right.

"You can be the cool uncle," she says. "Establish the relationship. Buy him a skateboard."

*

"The Synod has not yet reached a conclusion on the matter of Major Kincaid," says Da'an, "But I have found I no longer seek the counsel of the Synod in all things."

"Uh," says Marquette.

"It is his essence, infused into Zo'or, that has created our new circumstance. He is our progenitor, and a member of our Commonality. He must return with us to the Mothership."

"Oh, I don't think so," says Marquette.

"We are all of us new creatures" says Da'an, "We must learn together that we are one blood. Surely we must unify in peace, and not carry on ancient rivalries. How can evasion hasten us to our goal?"

"Still no," says Marquette.

Da'an says, "I would speak of this to him my own self, and explain the great weight of it. It is vital to the hereafter; ours, his, all."

"Ha, absolutely not," says Augur.

Zo'or says, "It is the gulf between soul and spirit that has caused the Major's fugue. When he returns he will be reminded of his doctrine, and go to it as a zealot. We will remedy his physical frailty. He is intended for me."

"Get out of here before I kill you," says Sandoval.

"You don't talk to them like that," says Boone.

"Out, Will," says Marquette.

*

"Also," says Lili, "What the hell was Doors up to? How could he not tell us? For seven years! What is he playing at?"

"I'll deal with Jonathan," says Belman.

"I'm not convinced he knew," says Sandoval.

"Of course he knew," says Lili, "He knew then and he knows now and he's already decided what's going to happen next."

"Seriously, fuck that guy." says Augur.

*

Lili is leaning against a wall. Sandoval is sitting on a chair backwards, one arm curled around in front. He closes his eyes as he scratches his eyebrow. Lili can see his wedding ring.

Sandoval says, "Do we have a good answer for, 'Do you only like me because you think I'm him?' ?"

*

Kincaid's whole life was at the center of a complex global political struggle. Liam will need a course in 21st Century History to understand it.

"There are difficult questions raised by even personal details," says Sandoval, "Quandaries I don't know if we're prepared to address."

"Come on, like what?" scoffs Marquette, who Sandoval has always felt to be an exceptional soldier and an unrefined thinker. "We were there; there's no mystery."

Augur is following at least; Augur is giving Marquette an incredulous look.

"Like," says Augur, "Are you going to tell him that Ha'gel loved Beckett and Sandoval very very much, and that's why he knocked them unconscious and commandeered their bodies and raped them?" Augur makes a little 'ta-da!' gesture, "Nine hours later, there you were!'" 

Sandoval says, "If Ha'gel created Major Kincaid to accomplish a goal, and Kincaid performed the task and was then immediately destroyed, does that mean he was only ever a tool? Was it his sole purpose and his destiny? Is having a destiny the same as lacking free will?"

"Yikes," says Marquette.

"We can't make it less true," says Augur.

### when i'm gone

What happened is really weird and sort of like something out of a movie, and when Liam wakes up Lili and Augur and Ron and Doctor Belman all try to explain it to him.

There used to be a guy named Kincaid, who all of them were friends with, and when Dawn touched Liam, it made Liam remember that guy's life. It made him remember all of it, all at once, and that's not really what brains are supposed to do so it made him sick. But not like a cold. Like a concussion. Like what happens if you fall down and hit your head, or a boxer punches you in the face. 

Everyone is mad at Dawn; it's wrong for adults to punch kids in the face.

The reason that Dawn was able to make Liam remember this Kincaid guy's life is because the his life was already in Liam's brain, and the reason for that is that it's physically the same brain. Doctor Belman knows a lot about brains and she says it's definitely the same brain. In fact the whole body is the same body. Kind of. That guy was an adult, and he got turned young by the Taelons, and the young body that he got turned into was Liam, age six, who didn't know anything about it.

Dawn made him remember it so fast and hard that he forgot again; but he's going to start remembering it slower. The guy's life was kind of terrible and violent, and the memories might be scary, and since Kincaid knew all of Liam's friends it might get hard to tell what happened to Liam and what happened to Kincaid. They'll talk more about it later, but right now the important part to know is that's it's going to suck, and they're sorry, and Liam can ask any of them anything whenever he wants.

Liam doesn't have to go to school tomorrow.

*

Ron is sitting on the couch on one cushion and Liam is lying on the other two with his feet crunched up by Ron's legs. Ron is making sure that Liam doesn't start throwing up or something because of his traumatic brain injury. Lili and Augur stayed yesterday, which mostly Liam spent asleep, but today they had to do something and Ron came over instead. Ron took off work to hang out with Liam; he isn't even wearing a tie. Ron brought a brand new Monopoly box. But right now they're just watching daytime TV.

"Okay," says Liam, who has been thinking hard about this and come to no conclusion. "So am I the same guy as him? Is he the same guy as me? When I remember am I going to be me or him or somebody else?"

"You're your own person," says Ron. 

But anyone could see that it isn't true.

Liam has no idea what is true. It's a little bit like being a clone. It's sort of like being possessed by a ghost. It's almost like they're twins, or like Kincaid is his dad that he never knew. Will it be like time traveling into someone else's body? Is Liam like a computer backup? Can he be erased?

*

Doctor Belman shows him a picture of his brain and a graph and points to it and says a bunch of stuff he doesn't follow. It's just colors.

"I don't feel different," says Liam.

"All right," says Doctor Belman, "What's this is called?" She's tapping the center of his palm.

"Shaquarava," says Liam.

"Mhm. And did you learn that in school? Vocabulary quiz?"

Liam didn't. Liam just knows it. He doesn't remember ever knowing it before.

"And can you turn them on for me, please?"

Liam tries and finds that he can. He turns them back off real quick.

"So," says Doctor Belman, "maybe you don't feel different, but you are, a little."

*

"Of course it isn't happening to me, and it's probably never happened to anyone else either," says Augur, "so I don't really know. But to me it doesn't seem like there are two different guys."

Liam is sick of talking about this. They never figure anything out. It only gets more muddled. He's got homework to do.

"I think that it's like Clark Kent forgot he had ever been Superman. It used to seem like there were two guys and now it seems like one of them is gone. But it's not true. Nobody died. Clark can still fly, and maybe he decides he wants to be a superhero all over again. But maybe he doesn't and keeps being a reporter. "

"Okay, " says Liam, "But that leaves out the part where Superman is an adult and Clark Kent is a kid, and Lois Lane knew something was wrong and didn't mention it, and the whole reason he forgot to begin with is because Lex Luthor used a mind-control ray on him, and then years later he uses the ray gun again and reverses it."

"Yeah," says Augur, "There's nothing poetic about mind-control rays."

*

Maybe they are the same guy, because Liam is afraid of things he didn't used to be afraid of. It's not rational or voluntary. He can't go into the medical room; the robot terrifies him. He kind of freezes up and says "no no no no no" and gets stuck in this what-if in his head. What if Belman straps him down on the table and he can't move his head and he can see the needle coming closer and closer and closer and then it's in him, in his brain, changing him, and then it pulls out and Liam gets up and walks out of the room and shoots Lili in her head.

Liam doesn't think Doctor Belman would do that to him. He knows she only puts CVIs in people who already have them, when they break, and that it's just medical; the CVIs don't force them to do bad things anymore. He knows she does this for Ron. 

"You wouldn't hurt me, right?" Liam asks Ron, quickly, before he can talk himself out of it. "He thought you would. But I don't think so."

They're in the Flat Planet after closing. Lili and Augur are downstairs talking to Doctor Belman about what just happened. Ron is babysitting.

Ron looks upset. It was a really rude question. Liam shouldn't have asked. What if Sandoval shoots him. 

"I don't want to hurt you," says Ron. There's more. It's not a yes-or-no question. "But I understand why he thought so. I did many terrible things when I worked for the Taelons. Some of them, I didn't have a choice. But some of them I did. And he, I suppose, he couldn't tell the difference. If there was one."

What if Sandoval tells Zo'or and then Zo'or sends the Volunteers and they catch Liam and then Zo'or imprisons him and sends him to the bottom of the ocean on another world and he spends his whole life in a cage alone with his regrets and it takes him a thousand years to die.

Maybe if they're already talking, they can talk. It's a lot, but Liam can be brave. It's already started. He just has to keep going. He just has to say it.

"Are you mad," asks Liam. "He thought for sure you'd be mad."

"Mad about what?"

Liam doesn't even have a word for it. The hard part. The sad thing. "Ha'gel," he comes up with eventually.

"oh," says Sandoval. "I'm not mad. Of course I'm not mad." 

He seems like he's going to say more but then he's kind of looking sharp at Liam. He stands up and goes behind the counter and comes back with two of the waxed bags for when someone orders a pastry to go. He gives one to Liam, and the puffs the other one up, then closes the top in his fist and breathes in it a couple of times. It's the thing nervous people do in cartoons. He wants Liam to do the thing. 

Is it helping? Liam doesn't know. They sit there and breathe for a while.

"Bad day, huh," says Sandoval. 

Liam nods.

"What's wrong?"

"I think you're going to shoot me," Liam admits. "I can't stop thinking it."

"I don't have a gun," says Sandoval.

"With your skrill," says Liam.

"I haven't got a skrill either," says Sandoval.

Liam closes his eyes. He breathes.

"I'm sorry that this can't be easier," says Ron.

*

Doctor Belman tells him that actually what happened yesterday is pretty much what they were trying to avoid by having lots of check ups and always asking Liam about how much does he remember and does he understand it and does he want to talk about it, and that it kind of seems like maybe Liam has been lying about not remembering and not understanding and not needing to talk.

Anyway, it's okay to lie sometimes, and it's okay to have secrets, it's Liam's choice, but they all want him to be happy. Part of being happy is hopefully not having panic attacks, and especially not having panic attacks that are so bad that somebody accidentally destroys something with his shaquarava, which we are all very pleased did not happen.

So, in the interest of nobody having a panic attack where things get blown up, does Liam think it would be a good idea if maybe Ron didn't come around for a while?

"no," says Liam, "he can stay."

*

Liam remembers but he also doesn't. Most of the time, it doesn't feel like it's part of him. Kincaid's life was really complicated; Liam doesn't really understand it even when he looks straight at it. It's like a sentence out of a book that's too hard for him. He knows all the words on their own but when he tries to put it all together into one idea, it's nothing.

Maybe there isn't anything to understand except that Kincaid and everyone around him didn't have much of a choice. That's what Lili says. She says: "Half of of us were being controlled and half of us were being manipulated and all of us signed up for it."

The parts of Kincaid he understands are the parts he already knew about: being afraid, and missing people, and wishing things were different.

He knows this part, too: Kincaid didn't have to forget. Kincaid forgot on purpose. Kincaid was trying to give him a gift.

*

They're pushing through a crowded Metro station. Ron is holding Liam's hand. 

"I'm too old for this," says Liam. Ron lets go.

"Don't get lost," he says.

"Jeez," says Liam. Like he's never been on a subway.

They're going to Ron's apartment. Liam's never been there before. Really Liam doesn't go a lot of places except home and school and the Flat Planet, and sometimes like the movies or whatever. So it's kind of exciting. Except--

"Did Doctor Belman say I could go?" Liam's been kind of a rule-follower since she chewed him out.

"She gave me some Xanax," says Ron.

"I don't need a Xanax!"

"Who says it's for you," says Ron. "It's not a great building, you may burn it down if you please."

This station is one of the ones built during the first Taelon occupation; the tunnel is totally round and purple and smooth, and virtual glass stops them from getting close to the tracks. 

Liam puts his hand on the wall. He's always thought Taelon design was pretty, but ever since he got the other guy's memories, he's more-- He can tell that it's alive now, that it senses him. But it won't rat him out to the Taelons or anything. It's like a flower that opens when the sun comes out. They're both the flower. They're both the light.

It's cool.

*

Ron's apartment is pretty normal. There are some bookcases, couch, coffee table. Boring stuff. There's a terrarium. Liam can't see the animal from here.

"Go ahead," says Ron, "that's why you're here."

It's got moss, and a little pond, and a heat lamp, and a log and lying on top of the log is a skrill. It's curled around it like an arm. She's glowing. She's lovely.

"Wow," says Liam. He presses his nose up to the glass but it's not close enough. Sandoval brings him a kitchen stool and he stands on it to look over the top. He sticks his finger close but doesn't touch. She puts one of her feet into the pond, and he lays his hand down so it's skimming the water. He laughs. 

He pulls his hand out of the water and turns his shaquarava on and off a couple of times. She copies him with the glow around her head. He makes his fingers walk across the moss toward her and when they get too close she fires a tiny little warning shot. Liam pulls his hand out and shakes it a little, but he's smiling. It didn't really hurt. It was like Raven told a joke.

He gets down off the chair.

"She's so great," he says.

Ron's sitting on the couch watching him. He's put snacks on the coffee table. Liam opens a can of Coke and sits down too, cross legged on the far end.

"Can I see," says Liam, and Ron seems to know what he means by that. He unbuttons his right sleeve and rolls it up the the elbow. Liam scoots closer and looks at the scars for a long time.

"You have to promise you're not mad," Liam says finally, "because it seems like kind of a big deal. It seems worth getting mad about."

"I swear I'm not mad at you," says Sandoval, "I'm not mad at-- at him either. It wasn't anything close to your fault."

Liam doesn't say anything.

"Maybe I was angry with Ha'gel, before I met you, when it was fresher. You're right; it was a big deal, and he did it without asking me, and without asking Siobhan. Siobhan died because of it and that was needless and-- tragic. She was lovely. But I'm not mad that you're here. I'm happy to have met you. I'm happy to have met both of you."

"okay," says Liam.

"You matter to me. I feel a connection. I want a relationship with you. If that's what you want too. I want to spend time with you, more than we do now. If that's okay. "

Liam isn't looking at Ron. He's kind of got his head pushed into gap between the couch cushions. Ron stops talking and pats his shoulder awkwardly.

"Okay," says Ron. "We don't have to talk about it. What do you want on your pizza?"

"onions," moans the couch, "pepperonis."

*

"Hey Pop," says Lee, coming in and putting his books and canvas down on a kitchen chair, rummaging in the fridge for the juice, drinking it out of the carton. 

"Good evening," Ron says distractedly from the couch, where he's sorting through some papers. Then he remembers and looks up. "What's this I hear about a boyfriend?"

"Lili can't keep her mouth shut," says Lee. He takes a meat pie out of the freezer and uses his shaqs to warm it between his hands. Lili is a badass Marine-guerilla-spy and surely keeps confidences necessary to global stability, but Lee ought to have known better.

His dad comes over and takes the meat pie away to stick it in the microwave. Just because one time--

"I want to meet him," says Ron.

"You are absolutely not going to meet him," says Lee.

"I need to know he's not the sort of fellow who would transform into a being of pure energy and forcibly inhabit another person's body," says Ron. "And also that he's not 35, I suppose. I don't know what parents typically hope to gain from these introductions."

"Gross," says Lee. "He's in my art history class, he's from Pennsylvania." 

"Is he also a dreamboat," asks Ron.

"He's never been to space. None of you are ever meeting him," says Lee, wishing for it, "and also you're not funny." 

"Dinner on Thursday would be fine," says Ron. "Perhaps Augur would care to join us." The microwave dings. 

Lee never wins. It's nothing to worry about.


End file.
